Careful What You Wish For
by kurosakiami01
Summary: 'I'm done' He screamed inside his head, deciding to forego the shower and go straight to bed. He was too damn tired. He'd shower in the morning. 'We're done for. I hate my life. I wish I'd wake up tomorrow and be anyone but me.' With that last lazy thought, Yahaba collapsed on his bed and dozed off. - Kyouhaba pre-slash. One shot. T because of language?


Hi! This is my first Kyouhaba work ever.

I was inspired by the prompt: You've had a rough day at work. You head home and go straight to bed, mumbling, "I wish I'd wake up tomorrow and be anyone but me," before dozing off. When you wake up in the morning, your dream has come true, as you quickly realize that you are not you—you are someone else… (writersdigest, anyoune but me).

It's crazy, but I hope you like it! :-)

* * *

 **Careful What You Wish For**

He brusquely took off his shoes and flinched when they made a loud 'thump' as they fell to the ground. It was late—later than he usually arrived, at least, and he really didn't want to deal with worried questions from his parents. And he would, if they were to come to him and see his bloody nose. It had already stopped leaking, but it was still swollen and he hadn't been able to wash away the dried blood as well as he could have. He'd been in a hurry to just come back home, quickly take a warm shower and just go and collapse on his bed. Preferably to be waken up Monday.

Exams were only a couple of weeks away and their teachers were going crazy, giving them mountains and mountains of homework to do, and to make things worse, they couldn't afford to slack off during practice either—the Inter High Tournament was approaching, too. And it'd be the first official tournament with the new Seijou team—with Yahaba as _captain_.

The pressure Shigeru felt was almost overwhelming.

He wanted, no, he _needed_ to make the senpai proud—and Shigeru knew for a fact that the four of them would be going to the games, so he was nervous. Furthermore, Seijou's reputation as one of the strongest teams in the prefecture rested on his shoulders, and he was terrified that he hadn't managed to create a team that was good enough to accomplish that. He was scared that they wouldn't be good enough. That _he_ wouldn't be good enough.

And as if all of that wasn't already stressful, Shigeru's relationship with his Ace was completely wrong. After last year, he had thought that Kyoutani and him had gotten into the same wavelength, that they somehow understood each other, at least when it came to connecting on the court.

His bloody nose could attest to the contrary.

For some unfathomable reason, Kyoutani and Shigeru simply didn't seem to be able to work well together. Shigeru's tosses were too slow. Kyoutani wasn't jumping high enough. Shigeru's tosses were too fast. Kyoutani jumped too late. And if they did manage to spike—

Shigeru has lost the count of how many of those spikes had somehow ended striking him somewhere.

This time it was his face. His nose throbbed in remembered pain.

'I'm done!' He screamed inside his head, deciding to forego the shower and go straight to bed. He was too damn tired. He'd shower in the morning. 'We're done for. I hate my life. I wish I'd wake up tomorrow and be anyone but me.'

With that last lazy thought, Shigeru collapsed on his bed and dozed off.

* * *

He woke up to a soft voice murmuring something unintelligible and a hand shaking him softly. Shigeru frowned, confused. Had he forgotten to configure the alarm? Had he been so tired that he actually slept through the loud ring of the hated but really necessary device? He struggled to open his eyes, but strangely enough, they didn't want to cooperate.

Shigeru was not a morning person—he was grumpy and easily annoyed and didn't really know what was going on until he had at least half of a cup of coffee running through his system. He always made a point of getting up early though, so that he could actually give himself time to wake up before he had to make his way to school for morning practice. It was a healthy habit, too, as it helped him when the team had training camps—he usually got out of bed, had a shower and drank his coffee before Watari made his appearance (and his best friend was one of those annoyingly cheerful morning people that woke up full of energy). By the time the rest of the team dragged themselves out of bed for breakfast, Shigeru was basically himself, which was for the best—he really didn't want to imagine what would happen in the event he crossed paths with the other boys before he'd had his coffee. It'd be _hell_.

"—kemi. Wake up. C'mon. I made pancakes."

Pancakes? Since when did father made pancakes? Since when did father made anything at all? Mother usually prepared traditional japanese food for breakfast, as she had the firm belief that sugar in the morning was not good for the body. Father? He didn't cook. Never. Shigeru didn't even know if his father knew _how_.

"Pancakes?" He slurred as his eyes fluttered open but immediately closed. His voice sounded weird though, it didn't feel like his. "With chocolate syrup?" His mouth continued without Yahaba giving it any orders, which made warning signals start to go off inside his head.

"Mhmm—Yes. As much as you want. But you gotta wake up and go to the bathroom first, all right?" Shigeru barely recognized the voice. It was male, scratchy. It sounded amused and fond. It was not his father's, definitely. Now that he thought about it, his father never woke him up like this. At most, he'd politely knock on his door and demand that he wake.

This was completely alien to him, and he didn't understand why his body wasn't reacting to his steadily growing distress. Why wasn't he tensing up? Why wasn't he opening his eyes and sitting up brusquely, demanding harshly why there was somebody in his room and what did he think he was doing?

"Mmm—don't wanna!" He sleepily pouted instead, and—all right. He was really starting to freak out now. What the hell? "The bed is comfy and my head hurts."

"Hurts?" The voice that Shigeru felt he should know but couldn't really place lost its amusement and gained worry. "How much? And does it hurt anywhere else? Does your throat hurt? Are you feeling hot? Cold?"

 _'_ _No it doesn't!_ _I'm not!_ _Could you stop it with you questioning already, what the hell?_ _'_

"No. Just—it's ringing like someone is screaming," he said instead. Now that his voice was clearer (even if he didn't know why in the first place he was saying things he hadn't even thought beforehand), he was alarmed to notice that it didn't sound like his at all. It was high, it was childish, it was _feminine_. Did he have a cold? Maybe he was more affected than he first thought.

A warm hand was put over his brow and Yahaba's eyes finally opened and stayed that way. With a bit of an effort, they focused on the face that was hovering over his. Brows furrowed and eyes that looked strange without the distinct eye liner, Yahaba immediately recognized the person.

He gasped in shock—but didn't.

"Nii-san. I'm fine. It only hurts a bit," his now childish voice said and he felt his lips stretch in a lazy but not less bright smile. His stomach gurgled, demanding food and he flushed in light embarrassment that he couldn't understand, couldn't process because he was too busy gaping incomprehensibly at Kyoutani's face. "And now I'm really hungry. I really want those pancakes!"

Kyoutani chuckled—warm and fond and so utterly different Shigeru had ever seen him that he almost couldn't believe it was him. The dyed blond hair with the weird stripes and the sharp angles of his face didn't lie, though. This was Kyoutani Kentarou and suddenly Shigeru knew he was dreaming. A strange, demented dream in which for some unfathomable reason Kyoutani woke him up offering pancakes and chocolate syrup and laughed freely—

"All right, up then."

Yahaba was horrified to notice that his arms acted on their own, stretching towards the other boy in a clear plea to be picked up. He darted a look at Kyoutani's face, sure that he'd stop laughing any moment now and would want to pummel him—

Kyoutani rolled his eyes but smiled indulgently and actually bent down towards Yahaba, putting his arms around him as Shigeru clung to his neck and then he lifted him.

And suddenly Shigeru knew that there was something really, really wrong with this dream, because he shouldn't be this small and Kyoutani shouldn't be treating him with such tenderness and he would never giggle delightedly as the other boy started to walk away from his bed—a bed that should not have a vibrant violet comforter because Shigeru didn't own one in that colour. And surely, surely he would never let his hair grow out this much—it spilled over his face and covered his vision as Kyoutani manoeuvred them inside a bathroom that he was sure was not there in his house.

"First you use the toilet, then brush your teeth and then we can have those pancakes, sounds good?" Kyoutani said as he deposited him on the floor. He squealed and then giggled as his bare feet (and they were so _tiny_ this was not _right_ ) came in contact with the cold tiles.

"Will you do my hair after?" He asked hopefully, batting the offending dark brown tresses away from his face.

"Sure thing."

"Yes!" He cried triumphantly and turned towards the toilet seat before stopping and facing Kyoutani once again, this time with a frown. "Now go away, nii-san. You're a boy, you cannot be here when I pee!" He said indignantly and Kyoutani chuckled once again, lifting his hands in a gesture of surrender before getting out of the bathroom and Shigeru couldn't really understand what did it matter because he was a boy too—and then he saw himself reflected in the full body mirror that did not exist in his bathroom and almost choked.

Because the person in the mirror was definitely not a boy, but a young girl with an extreme case of bead head and a spatter of freckles over her nose.

 _WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK?!_

* * *

Apparently, Shigeru was dreaming that he was co-habiting the body of Kyoutani Akemi, his Ace's nine years old little sister. And he was not in control. In fact, he could say that he was just along for the ride, and Shigeru was starting to seriously ponder the possibility that he had gone mad.

Maybe he had really bitten more than he could chew, and now his brain had decided to punish him allowing random stuff to appear while he slept.

He didn't even know if the little girl existed at all—Kyoutani usually didn't talk about his family. Or, now that Shigeru really thought about it, he didn't remember Kyoutani talking about anything unrelated to volleyball. When he did talk. Which was not always.

In fact, Shigeru was learning so much more about Kyoutani in the couple of hours he had been sharing bodies with his little sister in this weird dream than he ever had in real life. He had never seen Kyoutani smile so much—or not frown and scowl as much, maybe. If Shigeru had to describe this new found Kyoutani he'd have to say that he was nothing like the surly and standoffish boy he had to deal with at practice. This Kyoutani didn't snap at everything and everyone, didn't ignore him when he talked to him, didn't pierce him with a glare made even sharper with the definition granted by the eye liner he usually wore. No. This Kyoutani was gentle and patient and full of surprises—he knew how to braid his hair and how to make delicious pancakes and he listened indulgently when Yahaba— _Akemi_ blabbered on and on about a show she had watched the day before and about the neighbour's cat called Yuki and the girl in her class that said that she didn't believe Akemi's brother was the Ace in his high school volleyball team.

"And she said I was lying!" She cried out, tone filled with indignation and rightful anger.

"And what did you do?" Kyoutani asked curiously, lifting his eyes from the English homework he had been completing while Akemi finished eating her breakfast. And that was another thing Shigeru was not expecting—the ease in which Kyoutani completed the exercises indicated that he was good at English. It made him a little jealous (his English sucked).

"I told her that if she didn't believe me then she had to come with me to the next tournament and see for herself!" Akemi declared proudly. "I know nii-san's team is going to win everything, because nii-san is always practising and giving it his all!"

Shigeru couldn't be sure but he'd swear Kyoutani's ears had turned pink.

"Now, now. If we win everything it will be because my team is strong. Myself alone won't be enough, no matter how much I try. And I'm not doing that well, either."

"But nii-san!"

And Shigeru wasn't sure how that conversation ended because he got distracted with his own thoughts.

He was surprised. He hadn't been expecting Kyoutani to say something like that, because he distinctly remembered the boy the year before when he did what he wanted without any regards to the rest of the team. And even if he had changed slightly after _that match_ against Karasuno, the differences hadn't been that noticeable this year. Sure, Shigeru could see the boy was _trying_ —but he honestly hadn't believed that he was trying _enough_.

At lunchtime, he met Kyoutani's father—a big man with a gentle expression and freckles on his nose. If it wasn't for the fact that the man shared many features with Akemi, and Shigeru knew that she was related to Kyoutani, he wouldn't have imagined that both males were father and son.

The mystery of Kyoutani's looks was resolved when the small family took a moment before bedtime to pray and burn some incense in front of the picture of a pretty lady that had long brown tresses and sharp but very kind honey eyes. It was obviously Kyoutani's mother, and from the little Shigeru was able to pick up from their conversation, she had passed away a long time ago.

Now this could all be some strange vision created in base of a deep buried hope in his subconscious mind, but Shigeru was starting to doubt that. Especially when he woke up the next morning and he was still sharing Akemi's body.

He also doubted it because as weird as everything was, it was surprisingly consistent and really, Shigeru could not believe that he could imagine things like Kyoutani wearing an apron and baking star shaped cookies with colourful sprinkles and humming during Sunday afternoon. It was too bizarre an image for him to have imagined it.

He could have accepted it as part of his weird imagination though, if it weren't for the discovery he made the moment Akemi gleefully bit the first cookie of many. He moaned in delight at the taste and suddenly knew that this was no dream because you couldn't taste anything while you were dreaming, in the same way that you couldn't feel pain.

So, even reluctantly, Shigeru accepted that somehow everything was true.

* * *

He was not surprised when he woke up sharing a body with a little girl for the third morning in a row. He had resigned himself to the weird occurrence—even if he was not happy about it. (It was still giving him a headache, trying to understand how the hell he had ended up like this.)

What startled him was the fact that she was not being woken up by her brother, as she had been the two mornings previously, but by her alarm clock. He was also rather surprised that the little girl—who Shigeru had surmised was as much of a morning person as himself, which meant, nothing at all—got out of bed with only a little bit of grumbling and protesting before following her morning routine. But instead of going to the kitchen to eat breakfast in her pyjamas, as Shigeru was expecting, she changed into her school uniform before exiting her room. It was then that Shigeru realized that it was Monday and that he was effectively trapped inside another's body, which meant that he was probably missing morning practise—and pretty much the whole day of school.

He had a small—all right, _large_ —breakdown right then. Because he had been working so hard at volley and at school and now he was _trapped inside another's body and he didn't know why or how not to mention what to do about it!_

How was he supposed to go back to his body if he didn't know how he managed to get out of it in the first place? What if he was dead? What if there was some other entity walking around using his body and screwed up everything Shigeru had been working so hard on?

 _'All right, Shigeru. Think. This is not the time to freak out. I'm sure there must be a perfectly reasonable solution to this mess._ _There must_ _be. I just need to think carefully about it and everything will work out in the end,'_ he said, trying to convince himself. It was the only thing he could do.

* * *

By the time Akemi got back home from school, Shigeru had remembered the half-hearted wish that had crossed his mind as he went to sleep the night before he woke up with Kyoutani's offer of pancakes.

He had then proceeded to beat himself up for his idiocy and mutter the famous 'be careful what you wish for' under his breath at least one hundred times. Angrily.

He still didn't have a solution, though.

And to make matters worse, he had to suffer through Akemi's classes—He now remembered how utterly dull and mind numbing Primary School could be.

He was, in other words, sulking something fierce when Kyoutani arrived home at about four o'clock, eye liner on and frowning with annoyance. He looked just as Shigeru had always seen him, just as he had always looked during the two years that he'd known him, and it was slightly disconcerting after getting to know the boy during the weekend, when he was relaxed and comfortable in his own skin.

"I'm home," he said distractedly, and Akemi frowned when she heard him. She glanced at the clock and her frown deepened.

"Nii-san? What are you doing here? It's early!" He shuffled to the kitchen, looking pensive. Taking notice of his expression, Akemi promptly forgot her maths homework in favour of questioning her brother, feeling troubled herself. Shigeru didn't understand why, really. "What's wrong? What happened?"

"Afternoon practice was cancelled."

"Eh? Why? Didn't you say that your captain was very dedicated to making sure that Seijou won the tournament?"

"Yeah," Kyoutani said, and then rubbed his head with his right hand, scowling darkly. Shigeru would have thought he was angry, but Akemi gave him insight into the boy's personality and let him know that he was actually really worried. "That's the thing—He wasn't at morning practice. He never ditches morning practice. But he has been working himself to the ground, so we didn't think much about it. We figured he just overslept, which isn't too difficult to believe 'cause the guy has trouble getting out of bed normally but he wasn't in class, either. When we went to the clubroom today coach said that they received a call from his parents and were told that he was hospitalized—"

"What?! Is he all right? Is he hurt?"

"I don't know, Akemi. That's all coach said before he sent us home."

Shigeru was shocked. They were talking about him, and he couldn't really believe it because Kyoutani was obviously very concerned about him and since when did the boy took notice of him? How did he know that he was overworking himself? And that he was not a morning person? And since when did Kyoutani care about him at all? Wait… he was in hospital? _What the hell?_

"I'm sure he'll be fine?" Akemi tried to comfort his brother but her tone was rather uncertain and not reassuring at all, in Shigeru's humble opinion.

"Yeah," Kyoutani said, looking rather unconvinced. "I really hope so."

"Maybe you could bake him get-well cookies?" She helpfully suggested, and Shigeru perked up at that. He sure would love some of those delicious cookies!

"To get them thrown at my head?" Kyoutani snorted disdainfully and Shigeru frowned. Why would he think that—well, Yahaba might once upon a time have thought that it was some kind of joke and probably may have mocked him a bit for it but not—he wouldn't have thrown them at him! What the fuck? "No, thank you."

"You don't know that!" The girl protested hotly and Shigeru encouraged her from within her head. _'Yeah, you tell him, Akemi!'_ "He might like them!"

"Sure. If they weren't from _me_."

"Nii-san!"

"It's true, Akemi. The guy hates my guts."

"I'm sure Yahaba-kun doesn't hate you. You're being silly."

"Since when do you call him Yahaba-kun?"

Akemi shrugged. "What does it matter? You're avoiding the point."

"No, I'm not—Listen. Just drop it, okay? It doesn't matter."

"Of course it matters! Nii-san!" She called, but the boy had already gone away, pointedly ignoring her. They heard a door banging closed, and knew that Kyoutani had holed himself up in his room. Akemi huffed, aggravated at her stupid brother's stubbornness. Shigeru agreed whole-heartedly.

If he ever got back to his body, he'd be having a serious _talk_ with his Ace.

* * *

When he next woke up, he was really confused. There was something different, something he couldn't pick up on quickly enough to determine what it was.

He frowned, and when his brows actually moved down with the thought, Shigeru's eyes snapped open and he brusquely sat up on the bed. He looked around him in disbelief and then promptly lifted his hands to his face. Shigeru looked at them in wonder—they were large, with slender fingers that were callused from handling a ball for hours on end for years; not small and delicate and still a little pudgy from childhood. Then he actually explored his face with them, the straight nose and strong chin and short hair that he had missed seeing in the mirror for three whole days.

Shigeru laughed a bit hysterically when he realized that there was yet another common phrase that worked to describe his situation— _third time is the charm_ , indeed. He had gotten to sleep for the third time in another person's body, and woke up in his.

He was delighted.

Just then, his mother entered the hospital room and both startled. She looked pale and harried and had dark circles under her eyes, and Shigeru just knew that she had been scared beyond belief by whatever had happened to him.

"Shigeru!" She cried out in sheer relief and threw herself at him, sobbing her heart out while Shigeru uncomfortably held her and patted her back comfortingly. "Oh, thank God—I was so scared. You wouldn't wake up and we didn't know what to do and—they said you were in a coma—"

"I'm okay, mom. I'm fine," Yahaba soothed her, while his mind worked furiously.

He was back. He was back in his body and apparently it truly hadn't been a dream, because it was Tuesday and his mother informed him that his team had come to visit him yesterday while he was still asleep, worried about him.

The doctors hadn't been able to explain what was wrong with him. They theorized that it had to do with exhaustion, but weren't one hundred percent sure.

His parents had found him dead cold and unconscious Saturday morning, with dried blood on his face, and panicked. After trying to wake him up without any success, they had called emergency services and brought him to hospital where he was put under intensive care for the first day, until they tentatively declared him out of danger. He was then moved to a private room, hoping that he would regain consciousness soon.

After she calmed down, the doctors were called in and he was subjected to some tests to determine his condition. After some gruelling hours of being pinched and prodded, he was finally proclaimed healthy. They didn't let him go, though, as they still didn't know what exactly had happened and didn't want to risk him declining again, so Shigeru had to resign himself to spend some more days at the hospital.

Every member of his team and even the senpai visited him at least once during the four days that he was confined to his bed, except the one person Yahaba really wanted to see.

Kyoutani didn't even send a text.

Shigeru was annoyed, irritated and a little bit hurt. Why hadn't he come? He knew for a fact that Kyoutani had been worried about him and okay, he had shot down his sister's idea of baking him cookies but surely he could visit with Watari, at least?

Or maybe everything had really been a weird dream, something his mind came up with while he was unconscious and Shigeru had been a fool to believe it was true. Maybe it had been the way his subconscious had decided to punish him with for not taking better care of himself and not paying enough attention to his teammate. Maybe he had been unconsciously wanting to know more about Kyoutani and his mind decided to fill in the blanks with random facts while he was asleep.

Maybe everything Shigeru had started to accept as truth in regards to Kyoutani was simply the wild guesses of a tired mind, and nothing more.

He didn't know who he was angrier at—himself, for believing in those visions, or Kyoutani, for proving with his absence that they weren't real.

It was irrational, and Shigeru was pointedly trying not to think about how disappointed he felt about it when his door opened. He was expecting it to be his mother, coming to check on him and remind him once more that this was the last day and that the next he'd be going home with her—as she had done numerous times already that day—and was therefore very surprised when the voice that greeted him was not female.

"Uh…" Kyoutani coughed awkwardly and Shigeru's eyes widened when he saw him. "Hi," he muttered without making eye contact. He was wearing his uniform, red tie crooked and blazer on his arm.

"Hi," Shigeru answered, uncertain. It was suddenly difficult to breathe.

"You look good—fine. As in. Cured."

"I am. Thanks?"

"Yeah."

They both shut up and the silent room was making Shigeru nervous. His brain was flooded with things he wanted to say, things he wanted to ask, but it didn't seem like the rest of him wanted to cooperate in putting them into actual words.

"You know—"

"I brought—"

They started to speak at the same time and promptly closed their mouths, waiting for the other to go first. After a few seconds of uncomfortable silence, Shigeru got impatient and gestured for Kyoutani to get on with it. The other boy scowled.

"Fine. My sister insisted that I gave you these," he grumbled, producing from inside his duffel bag a small white bag tied up with a light blue ribbon. "Here. Have them."

Shigeru accepted the small package with trembling hands, painfully aware of the bright and all consuming hope that had suddenly appeared in his chest. Because if this was what he thought it was, then—

A radiant smile bloomed in his face as he peered inside after he undid the bow.

"Thank you, Kyoutani!" He said, beaming sincerely at the other boy and he was treated to the sight of a flustered Kyoutani Kentarou. Shigeru felt giddy with happiness, even though he didn't know why—yet. "They look delicious!"

They were colourful, star shaped cookies.

* * *

Thank you for reading!

Don't forget to let me know what you think! It can be here in a comment or you can go scream at me on tumblr (kurosakiami01)!


End file.
